Britain doesn't HAVE to be the worst place to live in Europe...

Britain is the worst place to live in Europe, according to a new survey.

Despite high earnings, our quality of life is sadly lacking.

We spend more on putting a roof over our heads than any of our continental neighbours, work longer hours and die earlier.

Our grocery and fuel bills are higher and we get fewer holidays than other countries.

Researchers compared data from ten European nations.

France came top of the league, with Britain rock bottom and Ireland second from last.

That probably explains why more and more people who can afford it are getting out. The weather doesn't help, either.

Frankly, I'm not quite so pessimistic as the authors of this report, even though I'm grumpy for a living. We're enjoying glorious autumn sunshine and we still have some of the most fabulous natural scenery in the world.

The British people have enormous reserves of kindness and goodwill and we're celebrated for our sense of humour.

What's wrong with our country is not the climate or the rip-off tax on petrol, though that doesn't help. Almost all our problems are manufactured, not inherent.

Britain leads the world in self-righteous, self-perpetuating bureaucracy.

Government has constructed a grotesque, gargantuan punishment culture, in our faces round the clock.

All proportion and common sense have been crushed. We are the most bullied and spied-upon nation in the so-called free world.

It is now virtually impossible for anyone in Britain to go
through life without falling foul of authority. Day after day,
irritating new rules and regulations are churned out.

Yesterday, for instance, brought a number of prime examples of
the onslaught of state interference in our lives. It was announced that
householders will be fined £1,000 if they put their potato peelings in
the wrong bin.

Who voted for that? Where does anyone get the idea that a
four-figure fine is an appropriate punishment for something so
piffling?

Veggie Benn has ordered a ' crackdown' on recycling, which
will see homes forced to sift their rubbish into five separate
containers, with an exciting range of penalties for noncompliance.

Government at every level is obsessed with non-existent
'climate change' to the point of mental illness, taking any opportunity
to criminalise the paying public in pursuit of saving the polar bears.

Is there another country on earth where the refuse collection regime is so petty and draconian?

On the same day it was also revealed that there are plans to cut
the motorway speed limit to 60mph and introduce toll roads to reduce
emissions, no doubt enforced by a new generation of surveillance
cameras.

Millions of people signed an online petition against road
pricing. But in anti-democratic Britain, the quango capital of the
world, the politicians have simply decided to ignore it.

It also emerged yesterday that a similar £1,000 fine has been
introduced to tackle people who forget to keep their dogs on a leash in
some parks.

The idea of a £1,000 fine for letting your dog off the leash
is beyond preposterous. But modern punishments bear no relation
whatsoever to the alleged severity of the 'crime'.

A thousand pounds is more than many people take home in a
month and over ten times the basic weekly state pension. What was I
saying about a complete lack of proportion?

Rightly, we suspect that these fines are simply a way of raising revenue to support the hideous bureaucracy behind them.

It was also reported yesterday that scout jamborees are under threat because of intrusive new vetting rules.

With official Britain in the grip of advanced and irrational
paedomania, every adult in the country is considered to be a child
molester unless he or she can prove otherwise.

A Scout leader who refuses to be vetted faces a fine of up to
£5,000. That's right, FIVE THOUSAND pounds. Is it any wonder that so
many decent folk who used to volunteer to work with children have
decided that the game isn't worth the candle?

There is no earthly justification for this absurd level of hysteria over everything from 'global warming' to child welfare.

Of course, the goals of reducing pollution, cutting waste and
protecting children are both laudable and desirable, but they don't
have to be pursued with such demented, vindictive zeal.

We used to pride ourselves as a nation on our level-headedness
and reason. That reputation has gone out of the window in a hail of
headless-chicken directives and regulation tailored to appease
single-issue lunatics.

Britain is facing the prospect of regular power cuts because
energy policy appears to be written to pander to the kind of
dreadlocked windmill fanatics last seen sitting on the roof of
Parliament. It's fair to assume the lights won't be going out in
nuclear-powered France.

While most of the avalanche of laws we have been forced to
endure in recent years have originated with the European Union, nowhere
do they seem to have been applied and enforced with such spiteful,
rigid enthusiasm as in Britain.

The smug bureaucrats and politicians responsible are never
going to announce that their work is complete, they simply spread their
tentacles into ever more areas of our lives which should be none of
their damn business.

Poll

Is Britain the worst country in Europe to live in?

Yes

No

Is Britain the worst country in Europe to live in?

Yes19686 votes

No12484 votes

Now share your opinion

The Conservatives will have their work cut out rescuing the
economy, but let's pray they also find the courage to dismantle the
suffocating apparatus of state oppression which has grown like Topsy
under Labour.

If they can, then Britain could once again be the best place to live in Europe, not the worst.

MPs' expenses: Let's start feeling collars

Former Home Secretary Jacqui Smith was ordered to apologise to the House of Commons over her claim that her sister's spare bedroom was her 'main home' for expenses purposes.

Why only Jackboots? Dozens of MPs made equally dishonest claims. If they all had to apologise the House would be sitting for a week.

Many more should have been forced to resign, but they are being allowed to cling on to the next election and will leave with a lucrative golden parachute payment and a juicy, taxpayer-funded pension. It is nothing short of outrageous that Alistair Darling, for instance, remained Chancellor of the Exchequer after flipping his address four times and avoiding capital gains tax.

And while comment on Gordon Brown's expenses has centred on him paying back £12,000 in gardening and cleaning bills, most people seem to be prepared to overlook the fact that the Prime Minister also flipped his address and spent £23,000 on a new kitchen, which he spread over two accounting periods so he could claim up to the max.

The porn film and duck houses hogged the headlines, but the scandalous abuse and wholesale theft, especially the systematic avoidance of taxes by ministers, went much, much deeper.

Former environment minister Elliot Morley, who claimed thousands of pounds for a mortgage he'd already repaid, still maintains offensively that this was nothing more than 'sloppy accounting'.

Anyone outside politics who used such a risible excuse to defraud taxpayers would have had his collar felt.

We don't need apologies, we need prosecutions.

A toast to proper coppers

Last Thursday, I was privileged to be invited to address the 60th annual reunion dinner of the retired Metropolitan Police CID officers' association.

It was reassuring to be in a room full of proper coppers who put thief-taking before box ticking and social engineering.

The highlight of the night was the presentation by guest of honour Lady Thatcher of bravery awards to three young officers.

Sergeant Stephen Hayter and Constables Michael Carroll and Richard Cousins risked their lives to tackle and disarm two gunmen in North London, even though they themselves were unarmed.

The police come in for plenty of stick, not least from this column. But it was humbling to meet these three brave officers and a potent reminder of the selfless heroism so many coppers exercise on our behalf every day.

A bridge too far, Gordon

The Dartford River Crossing is being flogged off to cut Britain's debts.

Let's hope we get a better deal than when Gordon Brown sold our gold reserves at car boot sale prices.

But it's worth remembering that the Government had promised that when the cost of the project had been paid off, tolls would be scrapped altogether.